After being on bed rest from 29 weeks on, and delivering a healthy, perfect baby girl, I was actually ready to have another baby about a year later. There was a good chance I would need to be on bed rest again, so I figured I might as well “get it over with” if I could.
I was extremely lucky. I got pregnant quickly, and knew I was pregnant immediately. I was actually in a staff meeting when I started to feel pregnant, and stopped at a pharmacy on my way back to the office to purchase a pregnancy test. And, yes, there is was, a positive.
I coincidentally happened to be going to my OB any way, and they did some bloodwork. I got a message the next day that my results were very low and I needed to go back. Thankfully, we found out that the lab had actually made a mistake the first time and reported my 30 progesterone number as .03.
I had a relatively uneventful pregnancy, although of course I had more spotting — this time at 5:05pm on a Friday (right before my Monday 8-week ultrasound). Because I am RH-, I had to go the Labor & Delivery, where I had an ultrasound and found that my baby was doing fine.
At my 18 week ultrasound, we learned that my baby was a boy (I was shocked about that, honestly) and I also found out that he had enlarged kidneys (a minor marker for Downs). My quad screen results came back great and I didn’t opt for an amnio. I had several more ultrasounds to watch the kidneys and to check for low fluid, but I never ended on bed rest.
The last few weeks, I developed a skin condition called PUPPPS. It’s pretty rare, but honestly the MOST itchy thing imaginable. I was so itchy. ITCHY, ITCHY, ITCHY. Painfully itchy. Brutally itchy. Couldn’t stop itching. Couldn’t sleep because I was itchy. You get the point.
The worse thing — the itching didn’t go away with my son being born. I went on prednisone to get rid of it, but it came back. Overall it took about 6 weeks to go away post pregnancy.
Back to my baby — he was born healthy, but still with enlarged kidneys. They improved steadily and were normal sized by the time he was two. He also had a small skin tag. My husband, in the operating room, referred to it as an “extra ear flap” which kind of sounded scary, but it was very small and we were able to have it removed when he was six months old.
So, I’m done. Two beautiful, perfect children, twenty-two months apart. I’ve very lucky, even though there were a few bumps in the road.
